The Bobcat Nation

Now that we have a kid, I have to care about these kinds of things ... what is the going rate for daycare around Bozeman or other parts of MT? We don't pay nearly as much as the ones listed here, but the prices listed are in the ball park of what we saw for quite a few of the places we visited. I'm just curious how this compares to the Bozeman market.

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/blogs/sfm ... 6109&tsp=1

What I've seen in Bozeman is between $550 and $850 a month for an infant. It's pretty high compared to many other places in Montana.

As a good guide, check this document: http://www.dphhs.mt.gov/hrd/childcare/b ... es_000.pdf" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

That is basically what the state of Montana will allow for childcare rates for low income families that are getting state assistance for child care. I know several of the places that we have used/looked into in the past used this as a guideline for their prices. And as rtb noted you will see that Bozeman (area) is definitely amongst the most expensive in the state

Thanks for the info, guys!

Holy sh!t, I'm glad my kids are in school.

We're paying $36 a day for two kids, but we're very lucky. We would normally pay $50 per day anywhere else. As a general rule, you can count on around $25 per day per child.

CapitalCityCat wrote:We're paying $36 a day for two kids, but we're very lucky. We would normally pay $50 per day anywhere else. As a general rule, you can count on around $25 per day per child.

There is no place in Bozeman that takes care of infants for those kinds of rates. After a pretty exhaustive search the cheapest that I found is about $38 a day, without lunch and extras. The most expensive I've found in the area is around $70-some dollars a day. So full time for a month puts it at between $800 and $1600 a month. If you only have one infant.

We've screwed up our schedules so that we will never need more than one day of daycare a week. Daycares don't like that. They all seem to want you to commit three or more days per week, or you aren't worth their time. I had several tell me that if I committed to one day a week for them for so many months that they could take my girls, but if someone came in and was willing to sign on for more days, then they would bump one or both of my girls. There is one place willing to do drop-ins without any commitment.

I was also amazed to find that the MSU Day Care doesn't take infants.

A lot of places don’t take infants because:
a) they are more difficult to care for and require more staff training
b) if the provider is state licensed the adult child ratio is 1:4 for infants or 1:8 for children over 2 years and 1:10 over 4 years

A recent study (don't have the date, or reference, just random memories of articles read) showed the overall costs of day care in most cases--if not all--outweigh the income gained by the second income.

Just a thought.

MT_expat wrote:A recent study (don't have the date, or reference, just random memories of articles read) showed the overall costs of day care in most cases--if not all--outweigh the income gained by the second income.

Just a thought.

That must just be in a specific area, right? It's certainly not true in our case.

Bay Area Cat wrote:

MT_expat wrote:A recent study (don't have the date, or reference, just random memories of articles read) showed the overall costs of day care in most cases--if not all--outweigh the income gained by the second income.

Just a thought.

That must just be in a specific area, right? It's certainly not true in our case.

That's definitley not the case in my sons family either (also in the Bay area- Orinda). They pay a small fortune for twin 3 yr. old girls, but they both make real good money.

GOKATS wrote:

Bay Area Cat wrote:

MT_expat wrote:A recent study (don't have the date, or reference, just random memories of articles read) showed the overall costs of day care in most cases--if not all--outweigh the income gained by the second income.

Just a thought.

That must just be in a specific area, right? It's certainly not true in our case.

That's definitley not the case in my sons family either (also in the Bay area- Orinda). They pay a small fortune for twin 3 yr. old girls, but they both make real good money.

Like I said, I have no basis for my statement, other than I know I read it somewhere, sometime.

I thnk most couples are probably doing the math and making the decision based on which option gives them the best result. It seems that most people would rather stay home with their child(ren) if that option was even close money-wise, so I'd be a little skeptical about that kind of statement.

I think most career women probably make a lot more than the cost of daycare, even for multiple children. When you factor in the loss of career advancement that would result if they took 5 or so years off, it's an even bigger financial hit.

We'd love to be in a position to let me wife stay with our kid ... but I haven't figured out a way to legally double my income yet.

Good point. If both parents work, then one person works for daycare and gets adult conversation in trade. Although, when I took my kids to the Ox during the day, I could actually make money at the poker table AND not pay for daycare...that was sweet!